Poland likely to be the next host of climate conference

December 04, 2012 - 6:04:49 am

By Isabel Ovalle

DOHA: With negotiations in Doha’s UN climate change conference about to reach their high point, Warsaw (Poland) will soon be announced as the host of the next conference. Poland wishes to hold the next summit to advance its approach to climate change in the global context. Krzysztof Bolesta, adviser to the Minister of Energy and Climate Policy of Poland, told The Peninsula that “all our policies revolve around climate, we are very committed to addressing it in a global context, given that in Europe we are responsible for only around 11 percent of the emissions”, he added.

The official announcement of the host of the new COP will be on December 7. With this silver lining to a week of high level talks, the Polish official said that “the major challenge is to sign the second commitment period to the Kyoto Protocol. It’s a pity that it will be quite empty”, he added.

About NGO’s criticisms towards Warsaw hosting the climate change conference, the adviser considered it “very strange”. He added that their first target when the country signed the Kyoto Protocol was a reduction of six percent between 1988 and 2012, but they delivered a 30 percent reduction instead, while at the same time the gross domestic product growth was over 150 percent.

On this basis he insisted that “it’s really strange for me to hear that NGO’s are against us. When we signed Kyoto Protocol we were an aspiring country with a very large industrial base in the communist block, and now we are in the European Union and we have cut the emissions by 30 percent.

“When we signed Kyoto we were receiving aids, now we are giving them. Hence, we are in the middle, we understand developing countries, and developed ones”, he stated.

Poland’s local climate strategy revolves around investing in water and new legislation on renewal energy. “We are trying to learn from Spain, among other countries, because this is also sustainable for the economy. In addition, slowly but surely we are trying to stimulate green technology”, added the Polish official.

In regard to the week of negotiations that lies ahead, he said that “we have our differences, but I think it’s too early to tell”.